Before I finished yesterday’s painting, I took some time to take pictures of the painting itself, and out the window. We don’t get a lot of fog out here, so the pea souper we got was fascinating to watch as it lifted. From thick and dense, it slowly dissipated – I was cold from the damp, but the view was great.
Besides doves and finches at the feeders, we have gotten squirrels and hawks and hummingbirds. It can be noisy or silent, the soft coo of a dove, and just funny to watch the finches jockeying for position to get to the seed. Beep! Beep! Beep!
I am not really sure what I am doing these days. I don’t really like what I am painting. Moving into abstraction to some degree, trying to loosen up, trying to be more suggestive than representational. Like anything new, or different, it can be very uncomfortable. A part of me wants to work with less intense colors, and for me, that seems like an impossibility! So, I keep trying. Let’s see where it all goes.
Watercolor, Arches 140# CP, 16×20.
Another wet-into-wet painting, but this time with more challenges and a longer painting period. As before, 140# Arches CP paper.
The goal of this painting was to get away from trees and aim for seeing how using a very wet piece of paper could be worked for skies and water along with plant life, from rushes and grasses to distant trees. The style itself lends itself more to softness in general, but with judicious brushwork and glazes, more defined areas were achieved. I also used white gouache to represent a tasseled top to the tall reeds (or whatever) in the middle right of the painting; I realized I might have achieved an airier effect by splattering some frisket in the areas I wanted white.
I painted the majority of the picture last night, working glazes over areas more defined to blend them in more harmoniously. Dry brush was used for the the foreground and in areas where a rough edge was needed to show plants.
I don’t think this painting is as good as the one I did previously. The contrast is not good enough to convey distance – too strong of colors were used to paint the reeds and trees in the horizon. I do like the colors and softness, though. Another point of focus was to create a point of focus! I tried to use birds, warm colors in the center of the painting, a bit of a vignette around the edges, and other visual tricks to lead the eye somewhere. Again, I don’t think I had much success. As well, the sky and land do not seem to match.
I did accomplish a few things I set out to do – wet-into-wet with some control for sky and plants and water. Doing it is a lesson in itself, and each painting teaches something. I worked on the painting last night and then refined it this morning. I had more patience than I usually demonstrate when painting in watercolor. Why is that? Is it because watercolor is wet and watery and seems to demand a bit of speed?
Anyway, more to come, more to learn.
A few weeks ago I posted about Emerald, a mother hummingbird, and a link to the live cam feed. This morning I went to check on them . . .
Ink, Yarn & Beer 